The New Synagogue () on Oranienburger Straße in Berlin is a mid-19th century synagogue built as the main place of worship for the city's Jewish community, succeeding the Old Synagogue which the community outgrew. Because of its Moorish style and resemblance to the Alhambra, the New Synagogue is an important architectural monument in Germany.
The building was designed by Eduard Knoblauch. Following Knoblauch's death in 1865, Friedrich August Stüler took responsibility for the majority of its construction as well as for its interior arrangement and design. It was inaugurated in the presence of Count Otto von Bismarck, then Minister President of Prussia, in 1866. One of the few synagogues to survive Kristallnacht, it was badly damaged prior to and during World War II and subsequently much was demolished; the present building on the site is a reconstruction of the ruined street frontage with its entrance, dome and towers, along with only a few rooms behind. It is truncated before the point where the main hall of the synagogue began.
Building
The front of the building, facing Oranienburger Straße, is polychrome brickwork, richly ornamented with sculpted bricks and terracotta, accented by coloured glazed bricks. Beyond the entrance, the building's alignment changes to mesh with pre-existing structures. The synagogue's main dome, with its gilded ribs, is an eye-catching landmark.
The central dome is flanked by two smaller pavilion-like domes on the two side-wings. Beyond the façade was the front hall and the main hall with 3,000 seats. Due to the unfavourable alignment of the property, the building's design required adjustment along a slightly turned axis.
The Neue Synagoge is also a monument of early iron construction. The new building material was visible in the outside columns, as well as in the dome's construction. Iron was also a core component for the now-lost floor structure of the main hall.
History
The New Synagogue was built to serve the growing Jewish population in Berlin, in particular, immigrants from the East. It was the largest synagogue in Germany at the time, seating 3,000 people. The building housed public concerts, including a violin concert with Albert Einstein in 1930. With an organ and a choir, the religious services reflected the liberal developments in the Jewish community of the time.
One of the concerts that occurred here was a Sabbath evening service composed by Jacob Weinberg (1879–1956) and conducted by esteemed conductor Chemjo Winawer. Winawer had been looking for a religious piece to conduct here and he discovered Jacob Weinberg's work. According to the Jewish Telegraph Service article of 26 October 1934, the Sabbath eve liturgy was performed in front of a packed house of 3,000 in this synagogue on 25 October 1936. It was met with an enthusiastic ovation. The work comprises twelve different musical compositions, all based on the prayers recited during the Sabbath Eve religious service. The collaboration was such a success that Winawer collaborated with Jacob Weinberg again on 5 September 1938 when he conducted Weinberg's prize-winning opera "The Pioneers of Palestine" (aka "Hechalutz" or "Die Chalutzim"), the first opera on Hebrew/Israeli themes (composed in 1924). It was performed on 5 September 1938, at another Berlin synagogue on Prinzregentenstrasse, as part of the Kulturbund. The Kulturbund was a program that permitted performances of Jewish works in Germany as the Nazi regime escalated. The Nazis did not allow Jewish works to be performed in regular concert halls attended by Aryans, but it did allow such works to be performed in other spaces such as synagogues. It was administered by Kurt Singer. The New Synagogue (the Neue Synagogue on Oranienburger Street) survived Kristallnacht, the pogrom of 9–10 November 1938. Unfortunately the equally-grand synagogue on Prinzregentenstrasse did not survive Kristallnacht. It was plundered of its valuables, torched, and ultimately destroyed; only a bronze plaque at the site remains of this magnificent structure. Both Jacob Weinberg and Chemjo Winawer went to the United States to avoid Nazi persecution.
During Kristallnacht (9 November 1938), a Nazi mob broke into the Neue Synagoge, desecrated the Torah scrolls, smashed the furniture, piled up such contents as would burn in the synagogue interior, and set fire to them. Lieutenant Otto Bellgardt, the police officer of the local police precinct on duty that night, arrived on the scene in the early morning of 10 November and ordered the arsonists to disperse. He said the building was a protected historical landmark and drew his pistol, declaring that he would uphold the law requiring its protection. This allowed the fire brigade to enter and extinguish the fire before it could spread to the fabric of the building, and the synagogue was saved from destruction. Senior Lieutenant Wilhelm Krützfeld, head of the local police precinct, and Bellgardt's superior, later covered up for him. Berlin's police commissioner Graf Helldorf only verbally reprimanded Krützfeld for shielding his subordinate and, partly in consequence, Krützfeld has often mistakenly been identified<!-- and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and at https://www.centrumjudaicum.de/cjudaicum_wp/en/zeittafel/ ?--> as the rescuer of the New Synagogue.